More than 20 years ago, a group of total strangers decided to meet in Oxford in the UK to celebrate their common interest in Tolkien and The Lord of the Rings. I say “total strangers” but in fact, these people had been conversing for a while through an on-line message-board called TORC.

Everyone had an alias and everyone had opinions about…well, everything. The gathering was called a “moot” from an old English word meaning “meet” and one used by Tolkien to describe the great meeting of the Ents.

I wasn’t at that very first Oxford Moot, but two years later, after I had joined TORC as “JewelSong” and begun sharing my own opinions and ideas, I ventured to Oxford for the first time.

That was a HUGE moot, if I recall. Almost 50 people…none whom I had ever met before, all whom I already knew by their posts and screen-names. I was definitely one of the older group members at the time. However, I have never felt more welcomed and included in my life. It felt like I had “found my people” and that feeling has remained.

For a while, we had a yearly Oxford Moot as well as smaller moots both in the UK and the USA. There were relationships, engagements, marriages, children and divorces. Friendships were forged and flourished. There were feuds and fractures. The original message-board underwent several iterations and there were even spin-off message-boards. Somehow, people stayed in touch.

Our original accommodation in Oxford also changed. We used to stay at this rather…odd…hostel/dorm called “The Mitre” which had its own peculiar charm. And it was cheap! But it closed, so we switched to the more upscale Keble College dorms, which were a bit better organized. They also served a complete breakfast in the incredible dining hall, which looks like it came straight out of Harry Potter.

The yearly moots stopped for a while and with COVID, nobody was doing any traveling anyway. Life was happening, everyone was busy, the movies were 20+ years in the past and Facebook had replaced the message-boards of old. And yet…there was still a longing for those simpler moots where a bunch of us sat in a pub for hours, enjoying a pint or three and the company of other Tolkien geeks.

This year, a member of the original Moot (known on the boards as Hobbituk) decided it was time. He was 17 years old at that first moot and this year (during the moot!) he turned a respectable 39. (And we got him a cake too!) He and another original member (known as Niniel*) organized our “reunion” and we had a marvelous time. More than 25 “Mooters” showed up. We talked, we drank, we made jokes, we toasted absent friends. And yes, we often still refer to each other by our “message-board names.”

My own children often kid me about my Tolkien fandom. But I am absolutely serious when I say, “Thank God for Tolkien!” Here’s to many more moots!